Roadhouse Blues
by vandevere
Summary: Werewolf(1987) Eric Cord and Alamo Joe pick the wrong diner
1. Chapter 1

Out on the freeway, betwixt and between, the miles passing under the wheels of Alamo Joe Rogan's trusty GMC.

"You hungry?" Rogan suddenly asked. "We're coming up on _Paul's Roadhouse Diner_. Best steaks in the county."

"Yeah…" Eric Cord nodded. "Sure."

Cord had learned a few things about how to handle his…_condition_. He had come up with a few rules to live by. One of which was to make sure he ate plenty of animal protein. Beef, lamb, chicken, pork…

It didn't impact how often Cord changed. That still seemed to happen around two to three times a month, regardless…

But a protein-rich diet did tend to ameliorate the worst parts of the Change.

The Beast tended to be less hungry when it manifested, less likely to attack the first living thing it met.

When they arrived at _Paul's Roadhouse,_ one of the vehicles parked in the lot was a bona fide stretch limousine.

_Someone with money. Lots of money…_

Inside, a very nice aroma greeted incoming guests; beer, wine, and the enticing scent of roasted meat.

"Huh…" Rogan gave a grunt of surprise.

"Rogan?"

"Harmon Teller," Rogan nodded at one of the occupied tables, at the old man sitting there. "Last of the old-time Oil Barons, richer than Midas, and meaner than the meanest rattlesnake. Thought he died years ago…"

The man…Harmon Teller…looked positively ancient; wispy silver hair straggling over a mostly bald pate, the skin of which looked parchment thin, veins clearly visible.

But here the old man was, sitting at the table, the remnants of a meal on his plate, three men, clearly security guards, sitting with him.

"What's he doing here?" Rogan wondered.

"Maybe he just wanted a good steak," Eric Cord suggested.

…..

"A good steak…" Rogan nodded, put the old man out of his mind.

_A good steak is why I decided to stop here…_

The staff person took them to a small table by the front window, placements for two, menus already on the table.

Minutes later, coffee was on the table, and two orders for Porterhouses-_rare_-had been taken.

Rogan looked out the window, saw a dusty beaten up looking van park right next to his GMC. That van must have been full. Seven men got out. They all looked like the van, dusty and travelworn…

Rogan felt a prickle of alarm work its way up his spine, laid a cautionary hand on Eric Cord's arm.

"They look like trouble," he warned, voice a low rasp. One of the men also looked familiar. Disturbingly familiar…

_One of the Scanlon boys._

_Shit…_

…..

"They look like trouble…" Rogan's warning hand on his arm, the man's voice low.

"You know them?" Eric Cord tried to swallow past a lump in his throat.

"One of them," Rogan nodded, keeping his head down. "Avery Scanlon. Took his brother, Chet, in a few years back. He's doing Life now."

"So…bad blood between you two?"

"Yeah…" Rogan sighed. "Bad blood."

As Cord watched, the men strode in. One of them looked their way, stopped suddenly, staring intently.

At Rogan.

"As I live and breathe…" he stated. "The great Alamo Joe Rogan. Come to take another one of us away, old man?"

"Just having lunch, Avery…" Rogan spoke quietly.

"Hey," the bartender spoke up. "No trouble here folks?"

"No trouble here…" Avery Scanlon spoke soothingly, but Eric Cord could see the rage in the other man's eyes. "Just me and Alamo Joe having a nice and friendly chat."

"You got a beef with me," Rogan rose to his feet, faced Scanlon. "How's about we take it outside? Leave the rest of these folk out of it?"

"Yeah…" Scanlon grinned. "We'll have that chat…"

It happened so fast, Cord's brain didn't have time to understand what his ears and eyes registered.

The explosive sound of a gun being fired…the gun…smoking…in Avery Scanlon's hand…the screams and shouts of the others at the roadhouse…And Alamo Joe…

Facedown on the floor, pool of blood spreading under his body.

Cord immediately dropped to the floor beside the man who had most unexpectedly become his friend, saw the gaping hole at the back.

_Shot through the chest…_

Gently, he turned Rogan over, checking for signs of life. Blood at nose and mouth told Cord all he needed to know.

_Not breathing…no pulse…_

Dead.

He looked up at Scanlon.

"He's dead," Cord accused. "You killed him."

"Had it coming," Scanlon snarled. "Took Chet from us. Got him sent up for life."

A minute of silence…

It was the Oil Man, Harmon Teller, who broke that tense silence.

"Well, now that he's dead," the man said. "What the hell are you gonna do with the rest of us?"

The other men in Scanlon's gang had their guns out too. Scanlon looked down at the dead body.

"Drag it into the freezer," he ordered the bartender. "Don't want it stinking the place up, do we?"

Terrified, people scurried to do Scanlon's bidding, leaving a wide streak of blood on the way to the freezer. Eric Cord stood now, holding Alamo Joe's sunglasses, and his Stetson, clenched between bloodstained fingers…

When the body had been cleared away, Avery Scanlon looked around at his assembled hostages.

"Quite a situation we have here, folks," he drawled, gun casually twirling between his fingers. "What are we gonna do about this?"

Eric Cord looked down at Rogan's hat and shades lying in his hands. Then, he noticed his right hand…

And the bloody pentagram…


	2. Chapter 2

Eric Cord stood there, holding a dead man's sunglasses and hat. The bitter irony of it all struck him.

_Julian Farrow kidnapped Alamo Joe, put my blood in him, gave him my curse._

_Farrow gave __**that**__ to Rogan, said the cure lay in Rogan's blood. Even if that were true, it doesn't matter now…_

Alamo Joe was dead, shot to death just a few hours ago in a random encounter.

_And I'm back to where I was before._

_No hope at all…_

He stared fixedly at his right hand, seeing the _Sign_ literally etched into his palm.

_And, very soon, I'll be a ravening beast._

_Again…_

He set Rogan's hat and sunglasses on the table, sat, keeping his head low. The pain…the twisting of nerves and muscles…hadn't started yet. But it would. Eric Cord would become the _Beast…_

_In a place full of innocent people who only came here for a steak and beer…_

Fortunately, Avery Scanlon had other ideas.

"You!" he growled; gun aimed at Eric Cord's head. "Traveling with Rogan, were you?"

"Uh…yeah…" Cord nodded, and briefly he wished the bullets in Scanlon's gun were silver. "I guess I was…"

"An…associate…of his?" Scanlon sneered.

"I suppose so…"

Cord was grabbed and unceremoniously dragged into the kitchen. He caught brief glimpses of terrified people, patrons and staff, hurriedly getting out of the way.

Now, he was alone in the kitchen, with Avery Scanlon, and two of Scanlon's…associates.

And Cord could feel the Beast within.

_Coming up…_

As usual, there were the cramps, horrible, almost backbreaking in their intensity; and the…fire…erupting inside his skull, erasing rational thought…

…_.._

_The Beast rears up, roaring its awful rage, claws raking across one man's throat, hurls another man out from the kitchen._

_Avery Scanlon has the sense to run out from the kitchen. The Beast follows them out; is met by gunfire as it clears the kitchen._

_If any bullets hit, the Beast doesn't feel it. Most miss anyway, pocking the metal freezer door, and the door handle._

_The beast roars, and the men flee outside, along with a few of the customers, the Beast hot on their tail._

_The Beast ignores the fleeing customers, focusing on Scanlon's men, and its bloody slaughter out in the parking lot._

_Scanlon's alone now. The others are all dead, rivers of blood literally streaming into the gutters. The Beast only has eyes for Scanlon._

_Somewhere, deep in the creature's animal brain, there lies the notion that Scanlon killed a friend, someone who mattered to the Beast. Someone deserving of the Beast's loyalty._

_The end is quick. The beast pounces, mighty jaws clamping down on the man's neck. A simple shake severs brain and spinal column, leaves the skull crushed at the back._

_The Beast turns looking back at the Roadhouse, at the terrified people watching inside. It howls, and those witnesses will afterward state that they had never heard such anguish before, in either man or beast…_

_Then, the Beast flees into the darkness…_

…..

It was evening now, several police cruisers, and ambulances too, parked outside. MEs thronged the parking lot, trying to deal with all the torn bodies outside. So intent were they on the bodies, that they all missed the naked man who stole quietly into the back of a GMC pickup. He reemerged a few minutes later, fully clad, and ready to face whatever came.

Eric Cord quietly walked back into the diner.

"Hey! You came back!" the bartender exclaimed. "Can't blame you for running like that. Almost everyone else did."

The lone exception was Harmon Teller; and the reason wasn't far to seek, his walker lying against the table.

Cord turned his attention to the freezer, and the police there, one of which was just beginning to operate what looked like an Arc Welder.

"One of those bullets damaged the lock mechanism, so they're trying to jimmy the door open however they can…"

He sighed as he continued.

"So, they can get to the body…"

Eric Cord sighed too.

_Alamo Joe…_

He turned to the table, saw Rogan's hat and shades. He picked them up, feeling such anguish. Stetson crushed between his fingers, Cord wanted to howl his grief, the way the Beast had.

_If Farrow hadn't…done what he did, Rogan would still be alive…_

"Aha!" one of the police said. "Got it!"

The door opened, and he slipped inside. Then…

"Oh, my god!" panic in that man's voice. "We need a medic! He's alive"

Cord shoved his way to the now open freezer door, looked inside.

Alamo Joe on hands and knees, shivering uncontrollably, looking up dazedly…

Without conscious thought, Eric Cord strode into the freezer, knelt by Rogan, too stunned for words.

_You're alive…_

"C-Cord?"

"Right here…"

"How did I…"

"Later," Cord temporized. "Let's get you out of here…"

On his knees, Rogan's hand lifted, touched the drying bloodstain on his shirt, literally spread across his chest.

"What the hell happened?" The Bounty Hunter lifted his eyes to meet Eric Cord.

"I'll explain…" relief shuddered its way through Cord's body. "But we need to let a doctor see to you…"

…..

The hospital was a local county hospital. The doctors decided to keep Alamo Joe Rogan under observation for two days.

Rogan hated it. But after Eric Cord's explanation of what went down at the Roadhouse diner, he could sort of see the point.

"You absolutely sure I was dead?" he had asked Cord. "No chance of a mistake?"

"Scanlon shot you right through the chest" Cord was firm on that point. "Even if the freezer had kept you alive, that kind of injury would've taken a _long_ time to recover from. Rogan…you _died._"

"Does that mean…" sudden fear jolted through Rogan. "Does that mean I'm a werewolf?"

"Only in the most technical of senses," Cord sat next to the hospital bed. "In all the time we've been traveling together, you've never Changed. Not even once."

Cord paused, bowing his head.

"Rogan…" he looked back up. "I think we should seriously consider the possibility that Dr. Julian Farrow might be right about you. That your blood might turn out to be a cure. Maybe not right away. But down the line, as your body adapts to it."

Lying there, on the hospital bed, looking into Eric Cord's eyes, seeing the new-found hope there, Alamo Joe could only agree that the possibility was there.

_I died…Then I came back to life a few hours later…_

"Maybe…" he finally said. "Still doesn't mean I won't kick Julian Farrow's ass when I find him."

…..

_Three weeks later_

Andrew Cole wondered why a rich man like Harmon Teller wanted to contract his services.

Cole was a private investigator, and far more likely to be hired by spouses suspicious of their Significant Other's loyalty. Or to find hidden assets in divorce cases.

It wasn't the career he had planned for when he left the Air Force. But it was the career he had ended up with. And, now, with his wife so ill, he needed all the jobs he could get, just to pay the medical bills.

Here in a salon in Teller's lavishly appointed mansion, he waited for the Great Man to make his appearance.

The sound of a powered wheelchair brought him around. Harmon Teller, accompanied by a slew of people…an attorney or two…and what looked to be a doctor, had arrived. Teller looked ninety years older than God, wispy gray hair doing little to cover the man's almost translucent skull; leaving bluish veins clearly visible.

The alive dark eyes, almost hidden in a nest of wrinkled flesh, looked up at Cole.

"Andrew Cole," Teller spoke as if reciting facts from a file. "Forty-five years old, Honorably Discharged from the Air Force twelve years ago, now a private investigator, with a very ill wife… Breast Cancer, isn't it?"

"Looks like you've done some research on me…" that sent chills down Cole's spine. "So, you know all of that is true. Why do you want me?"

"You know a Joseph Rogan? Called Alamo Joe by his friends?"

"Yes," that startled Cole. "We served in the Air Force together."

_The man was a pretty decent pilot…_

"What about Rogan?" Cole brought his attention back to Teller.

"He has something…very important…to me," Those dark eyes, almost black, gave nothing away. "I want it. To that end, I will pay anything for it. Firstly, I will pay you one thousand per day, plus expenses, with a juicy commission upon success. Also, I will assume all financial responsibility for your wife's medical care, and I shall spare no expense. Provided you accept my…assignment."

Andrew Cole stood there, pure amazement almost stopping his breath.

_What did Rogan do to catch this guy's attention?_

"Excuse me, but…" Cole stopped to clear his throat. "What could a guy like Alamo Joe have that you need? And what if I say no?"

"I'll answer your second question," Teller chuckled softly. "If you say no, your wife shall be dead, within the year, I would say. And _you_…you will go on, searching for infidelity at the behest of those who think themselves your betters, like a good little dog. Take this job, and you can retire a wealthy man, with your wife, alive by your side."

_There is that, _Andrew Cole reflected bitterly. _I can't do this forever…_

"All right," he finally sighed. "I'll do this."

He signed the contract provided by one of Teller's attorneys, and, as he signed his name, it occurred to him that he might be making a deal with the devil.

_But Adele, my beloved angel, is dying._

…..

After Andrew Cole departed, with promises to start right away, Harmon Teller looked around, at his attorneys, and his doctor.

"Soon, I'll have what I've been searching for."

The doctor, Lester Finn, stirred.

"Are you…_sure?" _Finn asked.

"I saw a man shot right through the heart, shot dead right where he stood," Teller rasped. He hated the wheezing notes at the back of his throat, deep in his lungs. "My guards saw it too. We saw the body dragged into the freezer. And, two hours later, we saw him walk out of that freezer. Sure, he looked rather the worse for wear. But he walked out under his own power. Maybe he has the Philosopher's Dream in his blood. Immortality may lay in his blood, and I want it."


End file.
